[[quoteright:350:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Sensei-chan-montage2_1400.jpg]][[caption-width-right:350:[-If you are a teacher in {{Animeland}}, and you wouldn't fit on this picture, you probably don't exist.-][[note]]Pictured, clockwise from top left: [[Manga/LuckyStar Kuroi-sensei]], [[LightNovel/ACertainMagicalIndex Tsukuyomi-sensei]], [[VisualNovel/FateStayNight Taiga]], [[LightNovel/{{Toradora}} Koigakubo-sensei]], [[Manga/KOn Sawa-chan]], and [[LightNovel/NogizakaHarukaNoHimitsu Yukari-sensei]], Center: [[Manga/AzumangaDaioh Yukari-chan]].[[/note]]]]

A common Japanese media character type, the [[HotTeacher female high school teacher who is fairly young, attractive]], even [[{{Moe}} cute]], and on friendly terms with her students.

On the other hand, she is still unmarried, and [[ChristmasCake very conscious about it]], as well as about [[DudeWheresMyRespect the lack of respect she gets]]. She is usually [[OneOfTheKids extremely childish, such that even her own students appear more mature than her]].

If the story's emphasis is [[ImprobablyFemaleCast on the female students]], she will act like one of the girls, a teenager in spirit. In HaremSeries with a male protagonists, she is more likely to be a bit HotForStudent, as a comical [[SupportingHarem side-character of the harem.]] A common character flaw PlayedForLaughs is [[HardDrinkingPartyGirl drinking enthusiastically]].

Their frequent complaints about being unable to settle down in a proper relationship, are probably based on the traditional Japanese culture's conflicting expectations, [[CareerVersusFamily that a married woman shouldn't work]], and [[ChristmasCake a woman over 25 should be married]], and for the intended audience of Anime, schoolteachers provided the first, childhood exposure to women with this dilemma, enforcing the stereotype that teachers are the sort of women who can never get married.

The trope's name is a combination of two honorifics, "-sensei" is used for teachers, like "Miss", and "-chan" is an informal affectionate diminutive. While the combined usage is grammatically correct, and it reflects the characters in spirit, it's unlikely that anyone would use it for a RealLife teacher either in this form, or as "-chan-sensei", since it would be about as conflicting and disrespectful as "Miss-baby", or "Teacher chick" in English.

On the other end, they tend to be on FirstNameBasis by their students, which is incredibly rare in real life. "-sensei", like its western equivalents, is normally associated to the last name, but these characters may as well not have one.

This trope can also overlap with MisplacedKindergartenTeacher or HippieTeacher. May preside over a WackyHomeroom.----!!Examples

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[[folder:Anime & Manga]]* Minamo "Nyamo" Kurosawa and Yukari Tanizaki from ''Manga/AzumangaDaioh'' are probably the {{Trope Codifier}}s, especially the latter. Yukari actually still lives with her parents and doesn't (Or at least ''[[DrivesLikeCrazy shouldn't]]'') have a driver's license; she might as well still be 15!** Nyamo is more mature and tries to keep Yukari in line. [[BerserkButton But don't remind her]] [[ChristmasCake that she's still unmarried.]]* Tomita "Tonchan/Tom-Tom" Mari, from ''Manga/AirGear'', is so young that one of her colleagues, who's in his mid-40s at the most, was her teacher when ''she'' previously attended the school. And she's incredibly childish and naive. By the way, she's definitely of the HotForStudent kind.* Sawa-chan from ''Manga/KOn'', who actually is addressed on occasion as "Sawachan-sensei".* Kuroi-sensei from ''Anime/LuckyStar''. Like some of her students, she spends a lot of her free time on {{MMORPG}}s. Unlike them, she's at least mature enough to not sacrifice sleep for gaming time. This is lampshaded in the manga.* Koigakubo Yuri-sensei from ''LightNovel/{{Toradora}}''. [[FirstNameBasis Frequently referred to by her students as "Yuri-chan"]], [[ChristmasCake she often laments about her lack of success in love and her age]]. [[KicktheDog Her students even go so far as to write a play]] in which her RedStringOfFate was to be cut, causing her to go [[BerserkButton berserk]].* Played with by Hinako Ninomiya from ''Manga/RanmaOneHalf''. She's got a weird condition (caused by Happōsai doing something odd to her when she was a sickly child to help alleviate her illness) where she oscillates between a sweet-cute child form and a voluptuous adult form depending on how much battle aura/ki she's drained from her students recently. The interesting part is that she undergoes a personality change with the size change -- she's mentally a child when in child form, and far more sophisticated as an adult. If she stays in her adult form for too long, though, she starts acting like her child form.* Yokoshima-sensei from ''Manga/SeitokaiYakuindomo'', also from the perverted HotForStudent kind.* Yukari in ''LightNovel/NogizakaHarukaNoHimitsu''. Acts very immature, constantly hits on the male students -- particularly the main character, who's the younger brother of her best friend and drinking-buddy -- and they all [[ChristmasCake completely ignore her]].* Mika-sensei from ''Manga/DokiDokiSchoolHours'' (whose original manga version predated ''Manga/AzumangaDaioh'' by a few years) is probably one of the more extreme examples: Despite being 27, she looks and (for all intents and purposes) acts like a twelve-year-old, and as such her students have a hard time taking her seriously.* There is Hibiki-chan from ''Anime/IMyMeStrawberryEggs''. Of course, ''she'' is a WholesomeCrossdresser.* Ko{{moe}}-sensei from ''LightNovel/ACertainMagicalIndex'' definitely seems like this, since she looks like a ten-year old girl who sleeps in cute pajamas, is friendly with her students, and is implied to be a bit [[HotForStudent hot for her "Kamijou-chan"]]. However, she also smokes heavily, drinks beer heavily, is implied to be at least in her 30s (and possibly much older), and most importantly of all, is an actually smart and competent teacher who acts as a mentor for [[TheHero Touma]].* Negi Springfield from ''Manga/MahouSenseiNegima'' would definitely be a gender-inverted exaggeration of this, being a ten-year-old male teaching a class of 31 fourteen-year-old girls. In some areas the trope is inverted entirely as he's far more mature than them, while in others he acts his age (he has the work ethic and emotional maturity of an adult, but still avoids taking baths and is easily flustered). The "-chan" suffix is actually never used for him, but the masculine "-kun" and "-bouzu" are often used by some of his students, even when addressing him directly.* Becky from ''Anime/PaniPoniDash'' is another exaggeration / parody, she's eleven years old, has graduated from MIT, and teaches high school.* Vera Collins from ''Manga/{{Heroman}}''.* Naru-chan from ''Manga/GirlFriends''. Actually referred to AS "Naru-chan-sensei," though not to her face.* The [[EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep nameless]] Teacher ("Komon-sensei", or "Ms. Advisor") from ''Eiken''.* Uzuki Shitenno of ''Manga/HappyLesson''.* Yoshinoya-sensei from ''Manga/HidamariSketch''.* Kyouko "[[GagBoobs Boin]]-sensei" Houin from ''Kodomo no Jikan'' fits most of the characteristics. She's definitely the most popular teacher (especially among the boys), but the students don't respect her much.** She has more success on the net, though. From here, [[CharacterDevelopment she also learns the dichotomy between "What parents/society expect from children" and "What is the best for children".]]* Haruna Sakurada from [[YouLookFamiliar both]] ''Franchise/SailorMoon'' and ''Manga/TheCherryProject'' is a good and early example. The Creator/DiC English dub of the [[Anime/SailorMoon anime]] turned her into another cranky teacher, so this aspect of her personality was gone.* Usami-sensei in ''Manga/GAGeijutsukaArtDesignClass'', like, more afraid of blood donations than her students. This is kind of justified in-universe as she's just in the second year of teaching.* Subverted in ''Manga/CodeBreaker''. The homeroom teacher is a ditzy HotTeacher who seems to be one of these. Then it's revealed that she's actually TheHandler, and the ditziness is [[ObfuscatingStupidity an act]].* In ''Manga/SketDance'', there Remi, who is a cute, cheerful and ditzy teacher, formerly a children TV show host, who insists that the students call her [[JapaneseSiblingTerminology "oneesan"]].* The teacher from ''Anime/{{FLCL}}'' is trying to be this... not especially doing that well, though. She best exemplifies the trope when she's teaching her students how to use chopsticks. And failing. ''Horribly''. [[EpicFail A grown Japanese woman who can't use chopsticks]]. To underline the ridiculousness, every single member of her class of elementary-school students has zero difficulty using chopsticks.* Kazuko Saotome in ''Anime/PuellaMagiMadokaMagica''. Her EstablishingCharacterMoment is complaining about her love life to her class before introducing the NewTransferStudent... Too bad the poor "girl" lives in a CrapsaccharineWorld. [[spoiler: Which costs her her life in the AlternateUniverse ''Manga/PuellaMagiOrikoMagica'', as she's ''EatenAlive'' by a witch's minion.]]* The alternate universe scenario in the final episode of ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'' put Misato into this role, rather appropriately. This is later carried over into both ''[[NeonGenesisEvangelionAngelicDays Angelic Days]]'' and ''[[ShinjiIkariRaisingProject Raising Project]]''.* Sakurai-sensei from ''Manga/{{Nichijou}}'', who seems far too timid to be in a teaching job. She's also the school guidance counselor so she can improve herself, but that doesn't seem to work out for her most of the time.* Marie Mjolnir from ''Manga/SoulEater'' fits the bill in most respects. She's such a ChristmasCake that she ''[[{{Cloudcuckoolander}} tries to marry a toilet]]''! She does have a dose of CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass, though, and makes an effective TeamMom.* Ritsuko Takahashi from ''Manga/HellTeacherNube''.* Hitomi Shimonome from ''Manga/{{Loveless}}''. [[DeconstructedTrope It's not pretty, though.]]* Kyouko Ono from ''Manga/KenichiTheMightiestDisciple''. She's very young and rather inexperienced, looks very cute when she cries, and she really doesn't know how to handle her rowdier students, but she's very caring and is able to help [[AntiVillain Boris]] come out of his shell.* Yukiji Katsura from ''Manga/HayateTheCombatButler''.* Mayuko Shiraki in ''Manga/FruitsBasket'', teacher of Tohru's class. Invoked when some of her female students address her as "Mayu-chan-sensei", and she demands (jokingly) that they call her "Mayuko-daisensei-sama" ("Great Teacher Mayuko"). She isn't particularly friendly toward the main (student) characters, though, and gets on Kyo's case quite a bit (mainly about [[YouGottaHaveBlueHair his orange hair]]).* Ayane "Ayanecchi" Tezuka from ''Manga/RougeNoir'' is the very rare ''protagonist'' example. As well as [[BrokenBird quie more tragic]] than the standard.* Yomiko Readman of ''Anime/ReadOrDie'' occasionally becomes this, given her cover identity as a substitute schoolteacher. This doesn't turn up in the [=OVAs=] or anime, though she had been one to Nenene.* Machiko-sensei from ''Anime/RinneNoLagrange''.* Kisaragi-sensei of ''Manga/UmiNoMisaki'', another teacher who looks and acts like a twelve year-old and constantly hits on the main character. She is [[ObfuscatingStupidity rather brighter]] than she acts.* Tsubame-sensei from ''Manga/AiKora'' mostly fills this trope. Young, unmarried, and hangs out with the girls in the dorm as well as part of the main characters harem. Can be considered partially subverted because she does not want to get married, in fact her character development has her [[spoiler: letting go of her deceased boyfriend and admitting interest in a new man.]]* Mitsuka-sensei from ''Manga/DearS'' ''wants'' to be this. However, while she has the "young, attractive and immature" part down, she completely overdoes the HotForStudent part and [[FanDisservice the whole thing just leaves her students disgusted]].* Namie Sasaki from ''Anime/SmilePrettyCure''.* Chihiro-sensei from ''LightNovel/SakurasouNoPetNaKanojo'', who decides that making one of her tenents to look after her IdiotSavant cousin is a good idea...* Miho Amakata from ''Anime/{{Free}}''. She is referred to as "Ama-chan-sensei" by her students (or simply Ama-chan by Nagisa) and is usually upbeat and quirky but tends to get [[TranquilFury quite mad]] when suggested to wear a swimsuit. She uses old and confusing literature phrases to make a point to her pupils and fellow teachers. It was implied that [[spoiler:she was once a swimsuit model named Marin-chan in her youth, but she became a teacher instead, which is why the boys initially asked her to be the swim clubs advisor (though they don't know what she did exactly).]]* Nekonome from ''Manga/RosarioToVampire''.* Karasuma in ''Manga/KiniroMosaic'', which gets {{lampshaded}} in Alice's "cast as a family" dream in Episode 11. In the dream, Karasuma was Shinobu's sister, while Aya is the ''mother'' and Youko is the ''grandfather''. Aya and Youko are her ''students''.* The self-proclaimed Manga/GreatTeacherOnizuka is a RareMaleExample.* Yui Kanakura in ''Manga/{{Nisekoi}}''. To list just some tropes concerning her: ChildhoodFriends, TeenGenius (she is one year older than her students), TheDon (not really), part of a BalancedHarem and one has to wonder if she isnít a MarySue, but luckily, she can only make [[OneNoteCook gyouza]]. And [[HollywoodToneDeaf she can't sing]]. She keeps a teacherly attitude during class, but only because she believes that's the proper thing to do.* Megumi Sakura from ''Manga/GakkouGurashi''. The protagonists won't even call her "Sakura-sensei" like she wants, instead "Megu-nee". She's a cute, young teacher with a ''giant'' IdiotHair. [[spoiler:She's also DeadAllAlong, being a PostHumousCharacter who was bit by a zombies prior to the series and thus becoming a zombie herself]]. Megumi [[spoiler:is less of an immature ManChild than other SenseiChan. She sacrificed herself protecting the three main characters from zombies and acted as an adult figure]].* Downplayed with DetectiveConan's Sumiko Kobayashi. She does show some traits of the trope when she tries to be the manager of the Detective Kids whether they want it or not, but otherwise she's pretty competent in her job and the kids from the 1-B class think she's rather cool. [[spoiler: And after she gets a boyfriend (or better said, [[ChildhoodFriendRomance a young man she met years ago "returns" to her life]]), there's nothing to worry in regards to the ChristmasCake part.]][[/folder]]

[[folder:Live Action Television]]* Sonada Sarina from ''Series/KamenRiderFourze'' seems to fill this trope. [[spoiler: Subverted in that her SenseiChan personality is just an act to hide her true identity as the Scorpion Zodiarts]]** If there's a SpearCounterpart to this trope, [[spoiler: [[IdiotHero Gentaro Kisaragi]] fulfills it in his crossover movie with ''[[Series/KamenRiderWizard Wizard]]'', although he's a ''mote'' less {{Keet}} than he was as a student at Amanogawa.]] Similarly, Ohsugi-sensei is halfway between this and a SadistTeacher: nobody takes him seriously, he's chronically hard-up for dates, and eventually admits that he has no friends. Once, he even tries to force Gentaro to hang out with him because he's lonely.[[/folder]]

[[folder:Video Games]]* ''Franchise/ShinMegamiTensei''** In ''VideoGame/{{Persona 4}}'', Noriko Kashiwagi seems to think she's this. [[FanDisservice She isn't]]. [[DeconstructedTrope And her students think it's pathetic]]** Toriumi from ''VideoGame/{{Persona 3}}'' hits this trope too, [[spoiler: though most of it comes out through her DigitalAvatar, Maya]].* Chloe Genus of ''VideoGame/Conception2ChildrenOfTheSevenStars'' is this, mainly because she's super popular with her students, the same age as most of them (she graduated from college at age 14!) and is a very cheerful person. She does get a little miffed about being this trope though.* Quistis Trepe from ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVIII''. [[JustifiedTrope Justified]] by the fact that ''she's the same age as her students'', but managed to graduate several years early, and was insane enough to get a job teaching her former classmates soon after.[[/folder]]

[[folder:Visual Novels]]* Misato in ''VisualNovel/SnowSakura''.* Played with in ''Franchise/MuvLuv''.** Jinguuji's students in the ''[[VisualNovel/MuvLuvExtra Extra]]'' part all call her [[FirstNameBasis Marimo]]-chan, and the usual ChristmasCake jokes get played. In the Unlimited alternate universe, she is not amused by the protagonist addressing her as Marimo-chan and demands to be addressed properly.** And then there's ''[[VisualNovel/MuvLuvAlternative Alternative]]'', which not only plays with this trope but uses it as part of a horribly soul-crushing plot twist. ''Twice''.* Wakaouji from ''Franchise/TokimekiMemorial Girl's Side 2'' is very carefree and playful when it comes to his students, so that many (including the protagonist by default) refer to him simply as 'Waka-chan'. Some take it even further, teasingly calling him 'Waka-chan-sensei'.* Taiga Fujimura from ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight'' plays with this trope; while she's rather immature when off-duty at home, she's generally responsible in her duties as a teacher.** She plays it dead straight in the alternate universe spinoff ''Manga/FateKaleidLinerPrismaIllya'' though where she's teaching Illya in primary school rather than Shirou in High School.[[/folder]]

[[folder:Western Animation]]* Miss Grotke from ''WesternAnimation/{{Recess}}'' has some shades of this trope. She's pretty much loved by all her students (and takes a CoolBigSis role to Spinelli), young and unmarried (not a ChristmasCake really, but it's hinted that she's in her early 30s).* Sun Park from ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDragonJakeLong'' is on a FirstNameBasis with her high school students, is young and pretty, and is a gentle mentor to Haley.* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'': When she's not portrayed as an ApatheticTeacher, Mrs. Krabappel comes across like this, particularly when outside of the classroom (though occasionally in it).* An odd equine example of this is Cheerilee from ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic''. To illustrate her status further, She's one of the biggest ensemble darkhorses in [[GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff Japan]].[[/folder]]